Monday, February 18, 2013

Alcohol and Recovery

This is a
follow up to Donald’s blog. I used to drink alcohol since I was about fourteen.I remember my first drink I could not even
finish the first bottle.After that I could
never get enough.I used drugs although
I would quit them and drink better than drugs.More friends would pitch in for alcohol.Every crime I committed I was drunk.I never was put in jail because of something I did when I was
sober.A person does not think when he
is drunk.My first DUI
came when I was nineteen and few months later I received my second DUI.I was put on antibuse and probation.The day I was off probation I proceeded to
get drunk on my favorite Bacardi 151.The police tried to stop me as I was driving again.I did not want to go back to jail.So I attempted to elude them and they chased
me even through Lincoln Park and they set up a road block on Speer and 14th and
stopped me.I received thirty more days
in jail and put back on probation.It costed a
lot for the lawyer to get me that deal.I was always paying the government to keep myself out of jail with fines
and lawyers.They asked me if drinking
and the life I was living was so rotten why I did not just quit.The answer I knew no other way of life.I would drink and be angry at the way life
was going, never had anything that I did not destroy.I had been to AA meetings with a friend
although was always drunk going to them so I never heard the message.My friend when he finally did quit it was too
late because he had developed cirrhosis of the liver.That is
eventually where that disease lands you in prison for life or a medical
disease.I’ve had two good friends that
were heavy drinkers that passed away young.Again I can say I am lucky, mental illness brought me a stop to my
drinking.I cannot say AA did even
though I believe their message.My last
drinking that brought me to the state hospital was my bottom.You can put all the alcohol in front of me
and I will not drink.I know what kind
of life it will lead to and I do not want it.I remember
attending an AA meeting in college and this new person came in and he told me
when I first saw you here and I was running the meetings at the time.He said “he is not a drunk, until you told
your story”. He became a good friend.It
is like I lived two lives.This second
life with my daughter and grandkids I would not give up for the world. I do not
put blame for those that started me off so young.It would have happened anyway. I am just
happy with life as it is and the problems I have that I do not have to drink or
drug to still be the same problems tomorrow.I can deal
with life and it is a lot better.I do
not destroy my stereo or possessions no longer.I can enjoy them.I do not make a
fool of myself.It is going on twenty
four years sober in April. I do not have any old friends from the old days
because in the past they were my trigger.When I try and get sober they did not know what to do with me.They are from my other life.I cannot forget the ways life was then and
them.